Setting Up Virtual Environments in Python | Information Technology and Computing Support (2024)

FAQs

Setting Up Virtual Environments in Python | Information Technology and Computing Support? ›

A Python virtual environment (venv) is simply a directory with a particular file structure. It has a bin subdirectory that includes links to a Python interpreter as well as subdirectories that hold packages installed in the specific venv.

A Python virtual environment (venv) is simply a directory with a particular file structure. It has a bin subdirectory that includes links to a Python interpreter as well as subdirectories that hold packages installed in the specific venv.

This tells us that there is a venv folder directly in your home directory - in other words, a separate venv folder (meaning, a separate virtual environment) from the one that is in ~/Desktop/Directory/venv . Using the command source venv/bin/activate while in that directory, will activate that virtual environment.

To do this, open a terminal window and navigate to the directory where you want to create the virtual environment. Replace /path/to/python/version with the path to the installed Python version, and myenv with the name you want to give to your virtual environment.

Email, chat, and web-based document sharing applications are all examples of virtual environments. Simply put, it is a networked common operating space.

Keep all your Virtualenvs in a disposable, central folder outside the project's folder: As the heading suggests, the ideal place for venvs is a central folder in a disposable location on your disk outside your project's folder. This can be your “Downloads” , “var/tmp/” or even “/tmp” folder.

How to check if Python virtual environment is activated? ›

Listing your Virtual Environments

To see a list of the Python virtual environments that you have created, you can use the 'conda env list' command. This command will give you the names as well as the filesystem paths for the location of your virtual environments.

Python venv is the most popular virtual environment tool out there. It comes with the Python3 installation. So, if you are using Python3, you do not need to install anything. Venv helps create lightweight virtual environments.

VirtualEnv helps you create a Local Environment(not System wide) Specific to the Project you are working upon. Hence, As you start working on Multiple projects, your projects would have different Dependencies (e.g different Django versions) hence you would need a different virtual Environment for each Project.

To create your first new virtual environment for Python, you will need the venv module. If you are using Python 3.3 or above, the venv module is included in the standard library, so there's no need to install it separately. Remember, if you are on 3.3 or higher, you don't have to run the above command.

Create a virtual environment

Open the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P), start typing the Python: Create Environment command to search, and then select the command. The command presents a list of environment types, Venv or Conda. For this example, select Venv.